After an investigation lasting two decades scientists in Spain claim to have confirmed that the remains of Christopher Columbus are entombed within Seville Cathedral. They have also addressed another long-standing mystery that has swirled around the great explorer more than five centuries after his death, regarding his exact origins.
Speculation has remained febrile across the years about whether the navigator who changed the course of world history by discovering the New World was actually from the Italian city of Genoa – as generally claimed – or whether he was actually Basque, Catalan, Galician, Greek, Jewish or Portuguese, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/oct/11/dna-study-christopher-columbus-remains-seville-cathedral"><mark style="background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)" class="has-inline-color has-vivid-cyan-blue-color">reports</mark></a> the <em>Guardian</em>.
It notes that the “long-running and often competitive theorising” was fulled by the “posthumous voyages” of Columbus's corpse. Although he died in the Spanish city of Valladolid in 1506, he wanted to be buried on the island of Hispaniola, which is today divided into Haiti and the Dominican Republic. His remains were taken there in 1542, but then moved to Cuba in 1795, before reportedly being brought to Seville in 1898 after Spain lost control of Cuba following the Spanish-American war.
The forensic medical expert José Antonio Lorente announced on 10 October that after <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/jun/01/spain.theobserver"><mark style="background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)" class="has-inline-color has-vivid-cyan-blue-color">two decades of DNA testing and research</mark></a> the investigating team could confirm that the incomplete set of remains in Seville Cathedral were indeed those of Christopher Columbus.<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/19/dna-study-sets-out-to-establish-true-origins-of-christopher-columbus"></a>
“Thanks to new technology, the previous partial theory that the remains in Seville are those of Christopher Columbus has been definitively confirmed,” said the expert, who led the study at the University of Granada. The conclusion followed comparisons of DNA samples from the tomb with others taken from two of Columbus's close relations.
Regarding settling the question of the explorer's origins and true "identity", that was not revealed until the airing of <em>Columbus DNA: His True Origin</em>, a special TV programme shown on Saturday 12 October, the date when Spain celebrates its national day and commemorates Columbus’s arrival in the New World.
During the program it was revealed that the scientific team have concluded, based on a genetic studies, that the famed explorer was most likely a Jewish Spaniard, the <em>BBC</em> <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ckg2049ezpko"><mark style="background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)" class="has-inline-color has-vivid-cyan-blue-color">reports</mark></a>.
They believe the explorer was probably born in western Europe, possibly in the Spanish city of Valencia. They theorise that he concealed his Jewish identity, or converted to Catholicism, to escape religious persecution.
Around 300,000 practising Jews lived in Spain, the <em>BBC</em> notes, before they and the country's Muslims were ordered to either convert to Catholicism or to leave the country in 1492, the year Columbus landed in the Americas, following the Catholic <em>Reconquista</em> – "Reconquest" – of the Muslim kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula.
The <em>Jewish News Syndicate (JNS)</em>, however, <a href="https://www.jns.org/experts-advise-caution-about-report-christopher-columbus-was-jewish/"><mark style="background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)" class="has-inline-color has-vivid-cyan-blue-color">adds a cautionary note</mark></a> regarding confirmation of Columbus's "origins", citing Jonathan Ray, professor of Jewish studies at Georgetown University, who says:
“The recent DNA evidence regarding Columbus is very interesting and helps to illuminate his biography and the era in which he lived. I would offer one caveat, though: While it indicates that Columbus had Jewish <em>heritage</em>, it does not indicate that Columbus was a professing Jew."
According to Ray, who is the author of the 2023 book <em>Jewish Life in Medieval Spain: A New History</em>, there is no proof that Columbus (1451-1506) lived a Jewish life, “nor even as a crypto-Jew", and that the historical record indicates he was Catholic.
He goes on to tell <em>JNS</em> that the historical record "would seem to indicate that he was a <em>converso</em>, or New Christian as they are often called – that is, a descendant of Iberian Jews who had converted to Christianity under duress during the century leading up to Spain’s expulsion of the Jews in 1492".
He adds that “some of these <em>conversos</em> remained steadfast to Judaism, albeit in secret”, while others “fully embraced Christianity and eventually integrated into Iberian society”. Thus knowing which applies to Christopher Columbus is all but impossible to conclusively establish.
<em>Photo: The tomb of Christopher Columbus in the Cathedral of Seville, Spain, 11 October 2024. (Photo by CRISTINA QUICLER/AFP via Getty Images.)</em>
